1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a scintillator panel, radiation detection apparatus, and method of manufacturing them.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is known a radiation detection apparatus including a scintillator for converting a radiation into light, and a sensor for detecting the light converted by the scintillator. The scintillator is made up of a set of columnar crystals and formed on a substrate by vapor deposition. Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2002-243859 discloses a method of removing unevenness from a surface of a scintillator formed by vapor deposition on the side of a vapor deposition end surface. Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 06-230198 discloses a method of planarizing a surface of a scintillator formed by vapor deposition on the side of a vapor deposition end surface.
An initial growth layer (layer formed in the initial stage of vapor deposition) exists on the vapor deposition starting surface side of a scintillator formed by vapor deposition. The initial growth layer may scatter light that is converted from a radiation before the light reaches a photoelectric converter because crystals have a granular shape or the columnar crystal has a small diameter. Such scattering may decrease the sharpness of an image sensed by a sensor.
The initial growth layer is stress-sensitive. When a temperature change causes a stress-strain between the building members of a radiation detection apparatus, the scintillator may peel off or a cohesion failure may occur within the scintillator.